Let’s say that my favorite son, Edward, was gunned down by a man for no reason other than he wanted a target for his hatred on that terrible day. If I then hunted the murderer down and killed him with my own gun, that would be vengeance.

If instead of killing the murderer, I captured him and turned him over to the police who then put him on trial for Edward’s murder and found the murderer guilty, that would be justice.

If I showed up at the penalty phase of the trial and pleaded that the murderer would not be executed for murdering my son and if the jury agreed with my pleas, that would be mercy.

But if after all this, I walked up to the murderer who had been judged guilty and already had received mercy, and I then grabbed his hand, took him home, sat him at my banquet table, and said, “From now on, you shall take the place of my son. You will have all his benefits and will be an heir to all my wealth. I will love you just like I loved him.”

That is grace, which God freely offers us each day of our lives.

Now, if I were a black American, it would be almost impossible to overlook the words of Malcolm X and not seek vengeance for the four hundred years of horrendous treatment by white Americans which has helped create who I am today. It would take a miracle not to avenge myself.

It would even be harder to go along with the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and accept simple justice, and then extend mercy to white Americans for all of their transgressions, wiping the slate forever clean of the harshest reparations against them.

Yet, to rise to the next level where I reach out, hold white Americans’ hands, and say, “You’re my brothers. I will lay down my life for any of you and if you need something, just let me know and I will do my best to get it. My heart is always open to your needs because I love you,” − this would be beyond any grace or love I could ever bring forth.

And yet, this is exactly what I believe the Lord is going to ask from black Americans.

Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:18)

10 responses to “Racism: Who’s in the Right? And Who’s in the Wrong? (Part 11)”

Larry, most young blacks today don’t know who Malcolm X was and don’t know anything about his rhetoric. Instead, many follow the rhetoric of “gangsta rappers” and mouth their brand of violence. But more often than not, the violence is black-on-black as part of gang and territorial warfare within the inner city and very seldom is it towards whites who have fled the inner city for the suburbs. As for most blacks, even those in the inner city, there is very little inclination or chance of a mass uprising against white society as some doomsday advocates proclaim.

The grace and love that you envision in your last paragraph does not happen in a vacuum. A black person in the ghetto is not going to wake up one morning and say, “I’m going to go across town and tell some white people that I love them and forgive them for all the hateful things they’ve done to us over the centuries.”

But I have seen that kind of grace and love expressed between blacks and whites when, on a few occasions, white Christian families have intentionally moved into inner cities and black communities to live among blacks and live out their Christian faith with them. It is in such a context–where both races have the opportunity to live in community–that I have seen racism dissolve on both sides and forgiveness and reconciliation nurtured and occur.

Sadly, I have also seen occasions when blacks have tried to move into a white community only to be driven out by burning crosses on their lawns, fire bombs, or death threats scrawled on their garage doors.

Thanks. I don’t really disagree with you and believe your input adds much to these discussions. But if it’s true that Malcolm X and Dr. King were prophets, then by the spiritual nature of their words, their words would still be echoing in the inner cities of America, waiting for vessels to speak them.

I pray that you’re right about “mass uprisings” not exploding into race wars. Nothing would make me happier than to be correctly labeled a “doomsday advocate” and mocked for being wrong.

We live on a cul-de-sac. There are 9 houses at this end with the following cultures in this little area: white, black, Mexican, Japanese, Puerto Rican, and the latest to move in are Brazilian. We all get along fine except for one person. She is the Superintendent of some school district in Richland county. Highly educated and probably makes as much if not more than the most highly paid employee of this group. She has lived diagonally across from us for 6 years. I do not know her name. She never speaks. She ignores us. She is black and her ex-husband who I loved dearly and was so much fun to be around until he left her told me, ” I can’t be with this woman and we are both Christians, but I can’t live with her. And by the way she hates white people.” She is a very, sad and lonely person.

Thanks. Good point about our Bible translations, not mentioning racism in the sense we think about it in America right now. The Greek word “ethnos” is translated into the English word “nation” in Matthew 24:7-8, but it could have been just as well translated as “tribe” or “people group.” And of course, tribe or people group could refer to a different skin color, but that is open to interpretation.

But even though racism is not really mentioned, the basis for the issue lies in two of the oldest sins of mankind: pride and fear.